Re: "natural" language?

Eric Stumbaugh wrote:
> I already know that the grammar reflects the three elements. All nouns
> belong to one of the three elements, and one can hear these differences in
> speech. A sort of "gender".
Sounds like it really is gender, not just "a sort of" gender.  Gender
doesn't have to be biological sex.

> what would the grammar of such a
> people look like? What things =wouldn't= it have?
Well, there's no absolutes with things like that.

However, technologically primitive peoples tend to have smaller
vocabularies in certain areas like color.  I can't really think of any
other things with the info you gave.  Is the society egalitarian?  Or is
it rigidly hierarchical?  If the second, you might want to consider
various levels of speech, like Spanish tú/usted or the much more complex
system of Japanese, where there are dozens of pronouns, the choice of
which depends on the speaker's sex, his/her rank relative to the person
being spoken to; verbal inflections to denote respect being given to the
subject of the verb, etc.  In vocabulary, what's important to the
people?  They'd tend to have larger vocabularies in those areas.

--
Dievas dave dantis; Dievas duos duonos
God gave teeth; God will give bread - Lithuanian proverb
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